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GROVER CLEVELAND 



"I want to tell you now that if every 
other man in the country abandons 
this issue, I shall stick to it," 

Grover Cleveland. 




President Cleveland at His Desk 



Admirable Americans -I 



GROVER CLEVELAND 

A Study in Political Courage 

By 
ROLAND HUGINS 




Washington, D. C. 

The Anchor-Lee Publishing Company 

1922 



■ H Si 



Copyright, 1922, by 
The Anchor-Lee Publishing Company 



Published May, 1922 



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g)C!.A674322 



*Vi4 



A Foreword 

Admirable Americans is a series of brief 
but complete biographies, dealing, for the 
most part, with leaders of the last genera- 
tion who have died within recent memory. 
A tentative and partial list follows: 

1. Grover Cleveland 

2. Theodore Roosevelt 

3. John Hay 

4. Andrew D. White 

5. John Fiske 

6. "0. Henry" 

7. "Mark Twain" 

Much of the biography which has appeared 
recently in America and in England has 
been written in a satirical or defamatory 
vein. The temper of the present series is 
quite different. Although these biographical 
sketches are intended to be just and impar- 
tial estimates, giving both the lights and 
shadows, the subjects themselves have been 
chosen for the reason that they are, on the 
whole, men worthy of esteem. 

Surely it should not be necessary to apolo- 
gize, in these days of studied mockery and 



supercilious ridicule, for the exercise of a 
little generous admiration. Says La Roche- 
foucauld : "To praise good actions heartily is 
in some measure to take part in them." 

It is a mark of really first-rate men that 
the more we study them the greater grows 
our respect, liking and admiration. Grover 
Cleveland is one of the Americans who meets 
this test; he well repays a closer acquaint- 
ance. 




Contents 

Chapter Page 

Foreword 5 

I Life and Character 9 

II Public Utterances 61 

III Correspondence 73 

IV Anecdotes and Estimates 80 

V Bibliography 94 



Chronological Summary 

Event Date Age 

Born, Caldwell, N. J March 18, 1837 

Admitted to Bar May, 1859 22 

Took office as Mayor of Buf- 
falo, N. Y January 1, 1882 45 

Took office as Governor of 

New York State January 1, 1883 46 

Inaugurated as President of 
the United States March 4, 1885 48 

Married to Miss Frances 

Folsom June 2, 1886 49 

Defeated in Presidential 

Election „ November, 1888 51 

Inaugurated as President, 

Second Time March 4, 1893 56 

Died, Princeton, N. J. „ June 24, 1908 71 




GROVER CLEVELAND 

I 

LIFE AND CHARACTER 

ROVER CLEVELAND left the 
White House at the end of his 
second occupancy, and retired to 
private life, in March, 1897. 
While a public leader is felt as contempora- 
neous, no one can be sure of his calibre. But 
in the retrospect across a quarter of a cen- 
tury it is possible to see a man justly. The 
controversies which quickened men's pulses 
a generation ago, before Bryan ever ran for 
President or the Maine sank, are now curi- 
ously cold. We are able today to read the 
lineaments of Cleveland's character without 
the distraction and distortion of partisan- 
ships. 

Cleveland came rapidly to the fore once 
he had attracted the attention of the public. 
In the fall of 1881, at the age of forty-five, 
he was elected mayor of the city of Buffalo. 
Three years later he was elected President 
of the United States. In the decade that fol- 
lowed he was the leader and idol of the Dem- 
ocratic Party, and easily the dominant figure 

[9] . 



in the political life of the nation. The qual- 
ities in Cleveland which caught and held 
public esteem for him were these: moral 
courage and independence of spirit, pains- 
taking industry, caution and thoroughness in 
the exploration of public questions, firmness 
in action after his mind was made up, and 
personal honesty raised almost to the pitch 
of a passion. People often spoke, in his 
time, of "Cleveland luck." It was a phrase 
misapplied. Roosevelt had luck — and made 
good use of it. But Cleveland's advance- 
ment, though rapid, was logical and 
orderly. He fought his way step by step. 
He had to fight both against the hostilities 
and rivalries which every public man en- 
counters, and against his own limitations. 
He was intellectually able, but not brilliant. 
He developed the capacity to handle situa- 
tions as they arose, but he did not make oc- 
casions. Although he never lost his hold on 
the respect of the country, there were times 
when his popularity and influence flickered 
low. When he stepped from power in 1897 
he was under something of an eclipse. When 
he died, in 1908, he was everywhere recog- 
nized as a man who had not altogether 
missed greatness; and since his death his 
reputation and good repute have grown 
steadily. 

[ 10 ] 



On his father's side Cleveland was of Eng- 
lish descent, on his mother's Irish and Ger- 
man. He was born at Caldwell, New Jer- 
sey, March 18, 1837, and christened Stephen 
Grover Cleveland. His father was a Pres- 
byterian minister, who had received, at 
Yale, a college education: an advantage he 
was unable to give his sons. In 1841 his 
father accepted a pastorate at Fayetteville, 
New York, near Syracuse, at $600 a year. 
There were nine children. Grover, at the 
age of fourteen, left school for a year and 
worked in the village grocery store, thereby 
swelling the family income for that year 
by $50. When his father died in 1853, 
Grover followed his older brother, the Rev- 
erend William, to New York City, and 
worked under him, as clerk, at the New 
York Institution for the Blind. At the end 
of a year he returned home for a summer's 
vacation; sought work, unsuccessfully, in 
Utica and Syracuse; started for Cleveland, 
Ohio; stopped to visit his uncle in Buffalo; 
and there found employment and a home. 
He entered a law firm as helper and office 
boy. His pay, at first $4 a week, had in five 
years risen to the flattering sum of $50 a 
month. In that period he acquired a legal 
education, and was admitted to the bar in 
1859, at the age of 22. He remained in the 

[11] 



o 



employ of the same firm, as law clerk, for 
four years more. In 1863 he was appointed 
assistant district attorney of Erie County. 

Not a Soldier in Civil War 

When the Civil War broke out, in 1861, 
Cleveland was 24 years old. To the calls for 
volunteers he did not respond. Two of his 
brothers served throughout the war, in the 
Union armies. Grover stayed with his law 
work. In 1863 he was drafted for service. In 
the Civil War a drafted man was permitted 
to furnish a substitute, or to pay for the 
procurement of a substitute. Cleveland paid 
At) $lyOO0, borrowing the money from his su- 
perior, the district attorney. This course 
afforded his political opponents, in later 
years, when he had become a candidate for 
high office, the opportunity to cry slacker. 
In 1892, for instance, during his second cam- 
paign against General Benjamin Harrison, 
Senator John Sherman of Ohio attacked his 
war record in the following language : 

"There is this to be said of him, that 
he was a man full grown at the opening 
of the war, an able-bodied man when 
the war was on. I have never known, 
nor has it ever been proved, that he had 
any heart for or sympathies with the 
Union soldier or the Union cause." 

[12] 



In this there may have been a grain of 
truth. Cleveland chose to be a Democrat on 
attaining his majority, in 1858, when the 
War of Secession was brewing, and the align- 
ments were being made. He undoubtedly 
followed the controversy closely, as did every 
other intelligent person; but his conclusions 
and convictions have not been recorded. 
During all of this period he was contribut- 
ing heavily out of his earnings to the sup- 
port of his widowed mother. His enlistment 
would have cancelled that help. We may at 
least be sure that he chose his course delib- 
erately. And everything we know about his 
character leads us to believe that he was not 
a coward. 

After a three years' grind as assistant dis- 
trict attorney, Cleveland ran for district at- 
torney on the Democratic ticket, and was 
beaten. During the following fifteen years 
he devoted his attention to the practice of 
law, with the exception of a three years' in- 
terval, 1870-1873, when he was sheriff of 
Erie County, his first elective office. He was 
successively a member of the firms of Van- 
derpoel and Cleveland; Laning, Cleveland, 
and Folsom ; Bass, Cleveland and Bissel ; and 
Cleveland, Bissel and Sicard. He gradually, 
in this period of a decade and a half, built a 
success and local reputation. He was known 

[13] 



as a reliable and clear-headed lawyer, who 
took an interest in civic affairs, and who 
talked good sense; as a man who paid his 
bills on the nail and attended assiduously to 
his business : altogether a solid citizen. The 
Buffalo Express, a Republican newspaper, 
said of him editorially soon after his nomi- 
nation for mayor in the autumn of 1881 : 

**We know Grover Cleveland. Nearly 
all of his fellow-citizens are aware of his 
distinguished abilities and reputation 
as a lawyer, of his great personal worth, 
of his unswerving uprightness, and his 
high moral courage. But we know 
something more than all this. It has 
happened to us to have had personal ex- 
perience of that sleepless vigilance, that 
tireless devotion, that singular penetra- 
tion and that broad good judgment 
which Mr. Cleveland has always dis- 
played in the interest of his clients, and 
from which so many have reaped the 
reward of a righteous verdict. If he is 
mayor, the city will be to him as his 
client— as a client standing more sorely 
in need of all his best endeavors than 
anyone he ever served before — and woe 
would be to the man that should attempt 
to rob or otherwise wrong her." 

He accepted the nomination reluctantly. 
The Democrats put him forward because 
they believed they could win with him ; and 

[14] 



they did, rather easily. He was elected 
mayor by a majority of 3,530. Buffalo, to- 
day grown to be a city of over a half a mil- 
lion, had in 1881 a population of 160,000. It 
was the third city of New York State, and 
was typical of most American cities of the 
period in the shoddiness and venality of its 
politics. Municipal waste and corruption 
gave Cleveland his opportunity. The day he 
entered ofRce he started to give the city a 
business administration. He discovered that 
the municipality was paying nearly twice as 
much as private persons for the construc- 
tion of plank sidewalks; he found that the 
city auditor was performing his duties in a 
most perfunctory manner ; he called attention 
to the fact that the municipal government 
was not getting a full working day from its 
employees. He pointed out that the city was 
paying far too much for street cleaning, for 
repairs to school buildings, and for public 
printing. He elaborated no general program 
of reform, seeking, rather, economy and ef- 
ficiency in concrete instances. 

A Plain-Spoken Mayor 

Within a fortnight of his inauguration the 
Mayor vetoed an appropriation of the Com- 
mon Council granting $800 to each of three 
German newspapers in payment for publish- 

[15] 



lishing a daily synopsis of the CounciVs pro- 
ceedings. This was a hoary form of patron- 
age. Cleveland declared that these subsi- 
dies were a sheer waste of public money, 
since the papers would in any event, as a 
matter of news, furnish their readers with 
some account of the proceedings of the Coun- 
cil. A few days later he vetoed a resolution 
directing the city clerk to draw a warrant 
for $500 in favor of the chairman of the 
Decoration Day Committee of the Grand 
Army of the Republic. He said that he was 
in sympathy with the object of the resolu- 
tion— *' the efforts of our veteran soldiers to 
keep alive the memory of their fallen com- 
rades"— but insisted that the money for this 
purpose should be obtained through the vol- 
untary subscriptions of citizens rather than 
through taxation. This act was characteris- 
tic of Cleveland. All through his career he 
refused to sanction the expenditure of pub- 
lic money merely because the object was 
deemed to be worthy. As Governor of New 
York he vetoed appropriations for soldiers' 
and sailors' monuments. As President he 
vetoed pension bills by the score. Only the 
stiffest kind of political courage will resist 
measures that are supposed to carry a patri- 
otic appeal. Cleveland had that kind of 
courage. 



[16] 



One of Cleveland's messages to the Com- 
mon Council became known as the "plain 
speech veto," and was widely quoted. The 
council had awarded the contracts for clean- 
ing the paved streets and alleys of the city 
during the ensuing five years to a favored 
bidder named Talbot, at a compensation of 
$422,500. The Mayor disapproved the reso- 
lution. He said: 

"The bid accepted by your honorable 
body is more than one hundred thousand 
dollars higher than that of another re- 
sponsible party for the same work ; and 
a worse and more suspicious feature 
in this transaction is that the bid now 
accepted is fifty thousand dollars more 
than that made by Talbot himself within 
a very' few weeks, openly and publicly to 
your honorable body, for performing pre- 
cisely the same services. This latter 
circumstance is to my mind the manifes- 
tation on the part of the contractor of a 
reliance upon the forbearance and gen- 
erosity of your honorable body, which 
would be more creditable if it were less 
expensive to the taxpayers. 

"I am not aware that any excuse is 
offered for the acceptance of this pro- 
posal, thus increased, except that the 
lower bidders can not afford to do the 
work for the sums they name. 

"This extreme tenderness and consid- 
eration for those who desire to contract 

[17] 



with the city, and this touching and pa- 
ternal solicitude lest they should be in- 
providently led into a bad bargain, is, 
I am sure, an exception to general busi- 
ness rules, and seems to have no place 
in this selfish, sordid world, except as 
found in the administration of muni- 
cipal affairs. 

'The charter of your city requires 
that the Mayor, when he disapproves any 
resolution of your honorable body, shall 
return the same with his objections. 

"This is a time for plain speech, and 
my objection to the action of your hon- 
orable body now under consideration 
shall be plainly stated. I withhold my 
assent from the same, because I regard 
it as the culmination of a most bare- 
faced, impudent and shameless scheme 
to betray the interests of the people and 
to worse than squander the public 
money. 

*'I will not be misunderstood in this 
matter. There are those whose votes 
were given for this resolution whom I 
can not and will not suspect of a willful 
neglect of the interests they are sworn 
to protect ; but it has been fully demon- 
strated that there are influences, both 
in and about your honorable body, 
which it behooves every honest man to 
watch and avoid with the greatest 
care." 

By his "plain speech veto" Cleveland saved 
the city $109,000. A little later he effected 

[18] 



a saving of $800,000, by pushing through, 
against the stubborn resistance of the Coun- 
cil, his plan for a special commission of five 
to supervise the construction of a new sewer 
system. The Common Council did not dare 
to override the vetoes of this blunt, out- 
spoken, hard-hitting executive, for public 
opinion had aligned itself behind him. Be- 
fore six months of his term of office had 
passed his methods and achievements had at- 
tracted attention in other parts of the State 
and nation. 

The New York State Democratic Conven- 
tion met that year in Syracuse. The dele- 
gates from western New York united to 
urge Cleveland as the nominee for governor. 
On the eve of the convention his supporters 
requested him, by telegraph, to come to 
Syracuse. He left Buffalo in the early even- 
ing, had a conference in Syracuse with Dan- 
iel Manning, party chieftain, and returned to 
Buffalo that same night. The next day he 
was nominated for governor on the third 
ballot. In the campaign which followed 
Cleveland attended to his duties as mayor. 
He did not make a single speech. His op- 
ponent on the Republican ticket was Charles 
J. Folger, Secretary of the Treasury under 
President Arthur. Cleveland's candidacy 
appealed especially to the independent 

[19] 



voters. He was elected by a majority of 
192,850. 

In the two years that Cleveland occupied 
the Governor's chair at Albany he solidified 
his reputation for courage, honesty and 
common sense. On his recommendation the 
legislature passed a State civil service law. 
He scrutinized expenditures; he cut off a 
useless Board of Canal Appraisers; disap- 
proved a legislative deficiency bill; and 
vetoed a grant of $20,000 for the Catholic 
Protectory of New York City. He cancel- 
led many appropriation items on the ground 
that they were gratuities — "purely dona- 
tions." He said "my conception of public 
duty leads me to the conviction that the peo- 
ple pay taxes for their benefit and protec- 
tion, and that forced contributions of the 
public funds are not justified except upon 
that theory.'* 

The Governor's Vetoes 

His veto messages were vigorous. The 
legislature passed a bill to "amend and con- 
solidate the several acts relating to the city 
of Elmira." The Governor denounced it as 
"special legislation of the most objectionable 
character." The legislature put through a 
tenure of office bill applying especially to of- 
ficials in New York City. Cleveland returned 

[20] 



it with the comment: "Of all the defective 
and shabby legislation which has come be- 
fore me, this is the worst and most inexcus- 
able." A new charter for the city of Lyons 
he described as " a mass of impracticable in- 
consistencies and incongruous and useless 
crudities, which, if allowed to go upon our 
statute books, would be a disgrace to the 
State and the law-making power." 

Among the scores of bills vetoed by Gov- 
ernor Cleveland were several granting spe- 
cial favors to corporations. He would not 
allow gas-light companies to use land with- 
out the owners' consent. He would not per- 
mit street car companies to monopolize 
municipal rights of way. He would not re- 
lease the shareholders of banks and other 
corporations from the obligations they had 
assumed. These vetoes pleased the people. 
Cleveland could easily have posed as a cham- 
pion of the people against the encroachment 
and greed of the corporations. But he was 
not posing. When a Five Cent Fare Bill, 
the result of popular clamor, was presented 
to him, he vetoed it promptly. At that time 
the elevated roads of New York City were 
charging different fares at different periods 
of the day. During three hours in the early 
morning and three in the late afternoon the 
fare was five cents; at all other times ten 

[21] 



cents. The bill which had passed the legis- 
lature proposed to make five cents the uni- 
form fare throughout the day. Cleveland 
held public hearings on the measure. He 
heard elaborate arguments from both sides; 
he studied the legal history of the question ; 
and he decided that the proposal was unfair. 
In his veto message he said: 'It seems to 
me that to arbitrarily reduce these fares, at 
this time and under existing circumstances, 
involves a breach of faith on the part of the 
State." He explained his reasons for dissent 
in a three thousand word argument. He ex- 
pected that his rejection of a measure spon- 
sored by workingmen, politicians and the 
press would raise a storm against him. On 
the contrary he found his message very well 
received. All the newspapers praised him 
for his temerity, and especially for the care 
with which he had examined every aspect of 
the subject. Cleveland never shirked the 
labor necessary to make himself understood. 
He stated in full his reasons for his acts. 
The people like that trait in a man ; a democ- 
racy appreciates the courtesy of explana- 
tions. 

Among the questions which came to the 
Governor's attention day by day were many 
applications for pardon. Cleveland did not 
delegate this task to subordinates, but 

[22] 



probed personally each appeal for executive 
clemency, often reviewing the entire record 
of the cases before him. The newspapers 
charged that he was too lenient ; that he was 
lavish in his pardons and commutations of 
sentence. In an interview Cleveland 
answered these criticisms: 

"The pardoning power is one of the 
most difficult and perplexing duties that 
a Governor has to perform. * * * 
Occasionally there is an epidemic of a 
particular class of crime in a section of 
the State; the public becomes excited, 
and it sometimes occurs that a man is 
convicted on insufficient evidence at a 
time when public sentiment is high; he 
receives a long sentence and, perhaps, 
all contrary to facts." 

It was Cleveland's habit to get at the facts. 

While Governor, Cleveland made few 
speeches. In his two annual messages to the 
legislature he confined himself to State is- 
sues, with the exception of a single passage 
on the decline of the American merchant 
marine, in the course of which he quoted de 
Tocqueville. Widespread interest had by 
this time been aroused in this burly, inde- 
pendent figure, who took orders from no- 
body, and declined to cater to politicians, or 
men of wealth, or representatives of labor. 

[23] 



His availability as a Presidential candidate 
was emphasized by the fact that he had 
proved his strength in New York State. 
During the quarter century which followed 
the Civil War national elections were close, 
and popular majorities small. To capture 
the electoral vote of the larger States was, 
therefore, the primary concern of party 
managers. 

A Campaign of Personalities 

The Democratic national convention which 
met at Chicago in July, 1884, nominated 
Cleveland on the second ballot. The Chair- 
man of the Convention said of Cleveland's 
admirers: "They love him and they respect 
him, not only for himself, for his integrity 
and judgment and iron will, but they love 
him most of all for the enemies he has 
made." During the campaign Cleveland 
spoke but twice. His Republican opponent, 
the brilliant and magnetic James G. Blaine, 
of Maine, stumped the country from end to 
end. The debate was supposed to center 
about the tariff; it actually consisted, in 
large part, of bitter personalities and of ap- 
peals to partisan prejudice. Blaine argued 
that to entrust the Democrats with power 
would be **to call to the administration of 
the government the men who organized the 

[24] 



Rebellion." A Democratic victory, he as- 
serted, "would rekindle smouldering pas- 
sions." This was familiar ground to Blaine. 
For years he had been active in the politics 
of Reconstruction, and had been one of the 
most adroit of those politicians who made 
capital out of the memories of the Civil 
War: a game then known as "waving the 
bloody shirt." Cleveland, on the other hand, 
represented a newer school and a different 
interest, which looked chiefly to a reform of 
political and economic evils. 

In this campaign of 1884 floods of per- 
sonal abuse were loosed. In some recent 
Presidential contests candidates have been 
made the victims of whispering campaigns, 
by which slanders have been spread as gos- 
sip. In those earlier days the mud was 
spread openly in the newspapers, and 
thrown by the spellbinders. The Mulligan 
letters, which had come to light eight years 
previously during a Congressional investiga- 
tion of Blaine's conduct as Speaker of the 
House, were reprinted and scattered broad- 
cast. These letters indicated that Blaine had 
used his official position to obtain bonds and 
large loans from the Union Pacific, the 
Northern Pacific, and the Little Rock and 
Fort Smith Railroads. Although the "Plumed 
Knight" had defended himself with skill, he 

[ 25 ] 



had failed to convince the more fastidious 
that he embodied the soul of honor. Many 
scurrilous stories about Cleveland were cir- 
culated. No one impugned his pecuniary 
probity; but it was charged that his habits 
were coarse and his tastes vulgar; that he 
consorted with low companions; that he fre- 
quently had been picked up drunk on the 
streets of Buffalo and carried home; that 
he was a habitual gambler; and that he 
courted the society of dissolute women. One 
highly embroidered and scandalous tale 
elicited from Cleveland the comment: *Tell 
the truth!" This message was the only re- 
ply that he deigned to make to any of the 
slanderers. All of the charges were gross 
exaggerations. Some of them sounded 
plausible because they were spun around a 
small core of fact. Cleveland was distinctly 
of the type known as a man's man. He was 
not a hypocrite; and he was not a Puritan. 
All his Hfe he drank to some extent; and he 
played poker occasionally. These were his 
chief sins. But the calumnies clung to him 
for many years. 

Late in the campaign Cleveland was asked 
to sanction the release of a yarn concerning 
an early indiscretion of his opponent, but he 
spurned the suggestion. Some of his sup- 
porters were less scrupulous; and the story 

[26] 



was published. Blaine was beaten, in the 
end, quite as much by dissension in the Re-^ 
publican ranks as by the exertions of the 
Democrats. He was repudiated by a group 
of Republican independents, including 
Henry Ward Beecher, William Everett, Carl 
Schurz, and George William Curtis. The in- 
dependents became known as ''Mugwumps." 
Six days before the campaign closed the Rev. 
Dr. Samuel Burchard, one of a delegation of 
clergyman who waited on Blaine in New 
York City, made the following pledge of 
loyalty: "We are Republicans, and we do 
not propose to leave our party and identify 
ourselves with the party of Rum, Romanism, 
and Rebellion!" Blaine heard; but he did 
not grasp the damaging significance of the 
words. They alienated some of his Catholic 
supporters in a State where, as the returns 
showed, every vote counted. 

First Term as President 

The result in the Empire State was in 
doubt for several days. In the rest of the 
country the Republicans had secured 182 of 
the electoral votes, and the Democrats 183. 
On the swing New York's 36 electoral votes, 
therefore, hinged the election. As soon as it 
was apparent that the contest would be close, 
the Democratic State Committee sent tele- 

[27] 



grams to all local headquarters, instructing 
them to detail vigorous and courageous men 
to watch the count. Cleveland made an an- 
nouncement which was bulletined through- 
out the country: "I believe I have been 
elected President, and nothing but the gross- 
est fraud can keep me out of it, and that we 
will not permit." After several days of ten- 
sion the official tabulations showed that 
Cleveland had carried New York State by 
1,149 votes. His popular majority in the 
country at large was 62,680. Shortly after 
the New Year he sent to tlje State legisla- 
ture his last message, remarkable for its 
brevity. It read : 

"To THE Legislature : 

"I hereby resign the office of Gov- 
ernor of the State of New York." 

Grover Cleveland was the first Democrat 
to occupy the White House in twenty-four 
years. He came into office with a horde of 
hungry partisans pressing at his back. 
Practically all the Federal offices were held 
by Republicans ; and he was urged to make a 
clean sweep. In fact, he was never given a 
minute's rest by the place hunters. In prin- 
ciple the President was a believer in Civil 
Service reform. Professional office seekers 
he held in contempt. He resisted the pres- 

[28] 



sure put upon him ; and when he yielded he 
did so reluctantly and late, with the result 
that the embittered politicians publicly 
scolded him. On the other hand Civil Serv- 
ice reformers were equally displeased. They 
pointed out that in two years Cleveland 
changed 40,000 fourth-class postmasters in 
a total of 52,600; 2,000 Presidential post- 
masters in 2,380; 100 collectors of customs 
in 111; 84 internal revenue collectors in 85; 
65 district attorneys in 70; and 32 foreign 
ministers in 33. To make the circle of dis- 
satisfaction complete, the President himself 
was irritated and aggrieved. In speaking of 
this period he afterward said to an associate : 
"You know the things in which I yielded; 
but no one save myself can ever know the 
things which I resisted." At another time 
he wrote : ' 'I doubt if I shall advise any one 
to lose the support of party in the hope of 
finding support among those who beyond 
partizanship profess a patriotic desire for 
good government." Cleveland's attitude on 
patronage boiled down to this : that he had, 
in nine cases out of ten, little reluctance in 
replacing a Republican with a Democrat, but 
he strongly preferred a competent Demo- 
crat to a party hack. Such a practice was 
better than a return to the spoils system. It 

[29] 



appeared to elicit, however, a maximum of 
criticism. 

On one subject Cleveland found occasion 
to lecture Congress in the same sarcastic 
tone that he used at Buffalo and Albany. A 
stream of private pension bills came to his 
desk for signature. He vetoed about one in 
seven: three hundred vetoes in all. In his 
veto messages he made it apparent that 
either the claimants were swindlers, or that 
their contentions were ill-founded. Further- 
more he vetoed the "dependent pension bill," 
which proposed to give to every honorably 
discharged veteran of the Civil War a pen- 
sion of twelve dollars monthly. By this ob- 
duracy on pensions he incurred the enmity 
of the Grand Army of the Republic. This 
organization, founded in 1868, had by 1888 
a membership of 400,000, and was supposed 
to control a million votes. The ex-soldiers 
accused Cleveland of being an enemy of the 
veterans, and a tool of "rebel brigadiers." 
In May, 1887, the President ordered that the 
flags in the custody of the War Department, 
both Union and Confederate, should be re- 
turned to the respective States. This "rebel 
flag order" was violently denounced through- 
out the North and West. The President had, 
indeed, exceeded his authority in issuing 
such an order, and he was obliged to rescind 

[30] 



it. In 1905, eighteen years later, Congress 
authorized the return of the flags to the 
States. 

In foreign affairs the President was firm 
and forehanded, although no momentous in- 
ternational question came to the fore during 
his first term. He suppressed, with United 
States marines, a revolt on the Isthmus of 
Panama. He sent a man-of-war to Ecuador 
to obtain the release of an American citizen. 
He negotiated a treaty with Great Britain 
which, had it been concluded, would have 
ended the long-standing dispute over the 
Canadian fisheries; but the Senate refused 
to ratify the agreement. He rebuked the 
Austrian government for refusing to receive 
an American minister on the ground that his 
wife was a Jewess. He sent Sackville-West, 
the British minister, home for an indiscre- 
tion in the campaign of 1888. 

Wedded in the White House 

Like James Buchanan, Grover Cleveland 
was a bachelor when elected President. His 
sister, Miss Rose Cleveland, directed the do- 
mestic and social activities of the White 
House during the first year of his incum- 
bency. On June 2, 1886, in the Blue Room 
of the White House, he was married to Miss 
Frances Folsom, the daughter of a former 

[31] 



law partner in Buffalo. Mrs. Cleveland was 
twenty-two years old: a tall, graceful, dig- 
nified girl, with a winning and tactful man- 
ner, who, as mistress of the Executive Man- 
sion, won a wide popularity. Their first 
child, Ruth, who became known throughout 
the country as "Baby Cleveland," was born in 
1891. 

As his term wore on Cleveland's policies 
took more definite shape. He revoked, 
through the Land Office, many grants of the 
public domain unlawfully obtained by rail- 
roads and speculators, and restored over 
100,000,000 acres to the use of homesteaders. 
He did what he could, after two decades of 
jobbery in the Navy Department, to create 
the nucleus of a modern fleet. He gradually 
became convinced that the Bland-Allison Act 
of 1878, under which the government was 
compelled, each month, to coin not less than 
$2,000,000 nor more than $4,000,000 in silver 
dollars, would eventually drain the Treasury 
of gold, and he recommended its repeal. 
The more he studied the tariff the more cer- 
tain he grew that the high protective duties 
then in force were responsible for two evils : 
first, they built up a large surplus of reve- 
nue and invited extravagant appropriations 
— always to him anathema ; and second, they 
imposed, both directly and indirectly, un- 

[32] 



necessary burdens on the consumer. Al- 
though loath to admit it, he tended strongly 
toward the orthodox doctrines of free trade. 

His annual message of 1887 was an inno- 
vation. He devoted every line of it to a dis- 
cussion of the tariff. He attacked high pro- 
tection with hammer and tongs, using both 
theoretical and practical arguments. The 
friends to whom he showed the message in 
advance strongly advised him to reconsider, 
declaring it would lose the next election. He 
replied : "It is more important to the coun- 
try that this message should be delivered to 
Congress and the people than that I should 
be reelected President." Cleveland came to 
his conclusions slowly, by processes of in- 
vestigation and reasoning, and when once 
he thought he had mastered a subject, and 
felt that he had the right of it, he never let 
go. A year later he told the Speaker of the 
House, "I want to tell you now that if every 
other man in the country abandons this issue 
I shall stick to it." A tariff bill sponsored 
by the administration was introduced in 
Congress, but failed of passage. Although 
the House of Representatives was Demo- 
cratic during these four years, the Senate re- 
mained Republican, by a small majority. 

Cleveland was renominated by the Demo- 
cratic national convention which met at St. 

[33] 



Louis in 1888, by acclamation. The Repub- 
licans nominated General Benjamin Harri- 
son, an Indiana lawyer, a Civil War hero, 
and the grandson of President William 
Henry Harrison. The campaign was com- 
paratively quiet. A truce was called on per- 
sonalities. Although the President received 
a popular majority of 98,000 in the country 
at large, he lost the larger States by narrow 
margins. The electoral vote stood 233 to 
168 in Harrison's favor. 

Cleveland took up residence in New York 
City, and resumed the practice of law. He 
had accumulated, by his savings and by ju- 
dicious investments in real estate, about 
$75,000. During the next four years he did 
not devote himself entirely to legal work. 
He was in great demand as a speaker. Invi- 
tations poured in asking him to address all 
sorts of public gatherings. When he ac- 
cepted, he carefully prepared his speech. He 
addressed audiences in New England, New 
York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan, 
choosing as subjects topics of current inter- 
est — ballot reform, tariff problems, the mone- 
tary standard, and political ideals. He made 
about ten speeches a year: forty altogether 
in this period. He also carried on an exten- 
sive correspondence. In February, 1891, he 
was asked by the Reform Club of New York 

[34] 



to express his opinion of the free coinage of 
silver. This was a time when nearly all 
politicians, in view of the great agitation in 
the West, were trying to prove themselves, 
in some fashion or other, the "friends of 
silver." Cleveland did not equivocate; he 
gave utterance to his convictions. In his 
letter he declared against ''the dangerous 
and reckless experiment of free, unlimited, 
and independent silver coinage." The next 
morning his letter appeared in every news- 
paper. Like most seemingly rash acts of po- 
litical courage it evoked more praise than 
criticism. 

As the Presidential contest of 1892 drew 
near, the rank and file of the Democratic 
party turned to Cleveland. Some of the 
politicians, however, were of a different 
mind. David B. Hill of New York sum- 
moned a State convention to meet on Febru- 
ary 22, fully three months before the usual 
time. This "snap convention" pledged tho 
New York delegation to Hill; but the trick 
proved to be a boomerang. The New York 
friends of Cleveland organized as "Anti- 
Snappers," and called a convention of their 
own. In the rest of the country the tide for 
Cleveland was irresistible. When the na- 
tional Democratic convention met at Chicago 
in June, more than two-thirds of the dele- 

[ 35 ] 



gates voted for Cleveland on the first ballot. 
The Republicans had renominated President 
Harrison. 

A Period of Popularity 

This campaign of 1892 turned on the 
tariff. Early in Harrison's administration 
the Republicans had passed the McKinley 
Bill, a very tall protective measure. Prices 
of commodities rose immediately. As a con- 
sequence the Republicans were badly mauled 
in the Congressional elections of 1890. Mc- 
Kinley himself lost his seat. This unpopular 
schedule was still in force in 1892, and re- 
ceived the concentrated fire of the Demo- 
crats. When the votes were counted Cleve- 
land's popular majority was found to be 
380,000, the highest he had ever received. 
The electoral vote was : Cleveland 277, Har- 
rison 145. 

The election of 1892 was a personal tri- 
umph for Grover Cleveland ; in popularity it 
marked the peak of his career. He came to 
the Presidency the second time at the age of 
56, in the full maturity of his powers. Long 
administrative experience and the weight of 
great responsibility had broadened an intel- 
ligence that was always robust, and made 
adamant a will that had never yielded to ex- 
pediency. In the following four years he 

[36] 



had need of every ounce of his strength. He 
was forced to break his way through a jungle 
of difficulties. He had need, indeed, for 
qualities that he did not possess, for great 
powers of conciliation, persuasion and tol- 
erance. He met every issue firmly: silver 
surplus, tariff revision, bond issues, the Pull- 
man railroad strike, the Venezuelan bound- 
ary dispute. In each encounter he fought 
through to some sort of a finish; but in 
each crisis he roused a bitter opposition. 
He successively alienated nearly every large 
section of public opinion. When he left the 
White House in 1897, he went out under a 
pall of disapproval, although like all men 
who look primarily to their consciences for 
approval, he was unperturbed. 

During his second term Cleveland played 
an independent hand in regard to appoint- 
ments. He flatly refused to place his time at 
the mercy of office-seekers. He issued an 
Executive Order which made Washington 
gasp: 

"The time which was set apart for the 
reception of Senators and Representa- 
tives has been almost entirely spent in 
listening to applications for office, which 
have been bewildering in volume, per- 
plexing and exhausting in their itera- 
tions, and impossible of remembrance. 

"A due regard for public duty obliges 

[37] 



me to decline, from and after this date, 
all personal interviews with those seek- 
ing appointments to office, except as I on 
my own motion may especially invite 
them. Applicants for office will only 
prejudice their prospects by repeated im- 
portunity and by remaining in Wash- 
ington to await results." 

For many months previous to the inaugu- 
ration in March, 1893, business conditions 
had been unsound. In June banks began to 
fail, and factories to close. By July a panic 
was in full swing. On June 30, the Presi- 
dent issued a proclamation summoning an 
extra session of Congress to meet August 7. 
In his special message of August 8 he at- 
tributed the financial and commercial dis- 
tress of the country mainly to the operations 
of the Sherman silver purchase act of July 
14, 1890. This statute, which had super- 
seded the Bland-Allison Act, required the 
Government to purchase, each month, 4,500,- 
000 ounces of silver, and to issue against 
this bullion, up to its full value, legal tender 
notes redeemable on demand in coin. Since 
the holder of the notes was permitted 
under a Treasury ruling to exercise his 
option, these coin certificates were really 
payable in gold. Between July, 1890, and 
July, 1893, the gold coin and bullion in the 

[38 3 



Treasury had fallen off by $132,000,000, 
while silver coin and bullion had increased 
by $147,000,000. The President demanded 
immediate action. In the House a bill to re- 
peal the silver purchase act was introduced 
August 11, and passed August 28. But in 
the Senate the advocates of silver attempted 
to talk the bill to death. During the course 
of the filibuster one sitting lasted three 
nights and days. After two months of ob- 
struction Cleveland managed to jam the 
measure through, 48 to 37. But in the pro- 
cess he depleted his powers of Senatorial 
coercion. 

When Congress reconvened for its regular 
session in December, the President declared 
that: 

"After a hard struggle, tariff reform 
is directly before us. Nothing so impor- 
tant claims our attention, and nothing 
so clearly presents itself as both an op- 
portunity and a duty. After full dis- 
cussion, our countrymen have spoken in 
favor of this reform, and they have con- 
fided the work of its accomplishment to 
the hands of those who are solemnly 
pledged to it." 

Representative William Wilson introduced 
a tariff bill which embodied the President's 
ideas. It provided for free wool, copper, 
coal, iron ore, lumber and sugar; and made 

[39] 



moderate reductions in the duties on con- 
sumption articles. In the House the bill 
fared well, passing by a vote of 182 to 106. 
But in the Senate it was twisted and muti- 
lated. Everything but wool and copper was 
removed from the free list. In all, the Sen- 
ate made 634 changes in the House bill. 
Even this patchwork measure was passed, 
after a four months' delay, with difficulty, 
by a vote of 39 to 34. The President was in- 
furiated. In a letter to Congressman Wil- 
son he protested: "Every true Democrat 
knows that this bill in the present form is 
not the consummation for which we have 
long looked. Our abandonment of the cause 
or the principles upon which it rests means 
perfidity and party dishonor." But the Sen- 
ate would not recede an inch, and the House 
was forced to accept the Senate amendments 
in their entirety. Although Cleveland would 
not put his name to the measure, he did not 
care to veto it, since it made an average re- 
duction of eleven per cent in the duties of 
the McKinley tariff, and since, furthermore, 
it composed the only kind of tariff legislation 
that he could get. He allowed it to become a 
law without his signature. He gave voice, 
however, to his disgust: 

"Tariff reform will not be settled un- 
til it is honestly and fairly settled, in 

[40] 



the interest and to the benefit of a 
patient and long-suffering people. I 
take my place with the rank and file of 
the Democratic party, who are not 
blinded to the fact that the livery of the 
Democratic tariff reform has been 
stolen and worn in the service of Re- 
publican protection." 

Dwindling Gold Reserves 

The President had hoped that the repeal 
of the Sherman Silver Purchase Act and the 
enactment of a new tariff law would dispel 
the industrial depression from which the 
country was suffering, and relieve the Treas- 
ury of its embarrassments. But he soon en- 
countered even worse difficulties. There were 
outstanding at this time about $346,000,000 
in greenbacks, behind which stood a gold 
fund of $100,000,000, while other issues of 
paper currency brought the total of notes in 
circulation to approximately $500,000,000 
The silver certificates, issued under the 
Bland-Allison Act of 1878, were redeemable 
in silver. The coin notes, issued under the 
Sherman Act of 1890, were redeemable in 
coin, that is, in either gold or silver, at the 
option of the Treasury. Cleveland decided 
that all of the Government paper, green- 
backs, silver certificates, and coin notes, 
should, in fair financial weather or foul, be 

[41] 



redeemed in gold. Any other course, he 
thought, would cast a doubt on **the good 
faith and honest intentions of the Govern- 
ment's professions, or create a suspicion of 
our country's solvency." Such a policy con- 
tained grave dangers. By law the currency 
was inelastic; and in practice gold was 
drawn from the Treasury not alone by the 
timid, but chiefly by those whose only pur- 
pose was profit. In this situation the Pres- 
ident unquestionably could have checked the 
raid on gold by putting into circulation a 
portion of the Treasuy's stock of silver. But 
he had ruled otherwise, and having made his 
decision he sustained it with inflexible deter- 
mination. As a consequence he was forced 
to sell government bonds in a period of 
peace, for the first time in the country's his- 
tory. 

In April, 1893, the Treasury's gold re- 
demption fund fell below $100,000,000. By 
January 1, 1894, it was down to $70,000,000. 
On January 17, the President directed that 
an issue of $50,000,000 in United States 
bonds be offered for sale in exchange for 
gold. By this method the gold reserve was 
built up to $107,000,000. But by November 
of the same year the fund had dwindled to 
$61,000,000. A second issue of $50,000,000 

[42] 



in bonds was offered for gold. This issue 
was taken up by a syndicate of thirty-three 
banking-houses. The banks, holding their 
own gold out of the public's reach, were 
finding it profitable to siphon gold from the 
Treasury and sell it back for bonds. Three 
months after the second bond sale, in Feb- 
ruary, 1895, there remained only $41,000,- 
000 in the government's gold reserve. In 
this emergency the President appealed to 
J. Pierpont Morgan and other financiers in 
New York. An arrangement was reached 
whereby a banking syndicate agreed to pay 
$65,117,000 in gold for $62,515,000 in 4 per 
cent bonds. The bankers also pledged them- 
selves to ''exert all financial influence and 
make all legitimate efforts to protect the 
Treasury of the United States against the 
withdrawal of gold." After this the drive 
on the Treasury ceased. The 4 per cent 
bonds, however, which had been obtained 
from the government at 104i/^, were offered 
for sale on the open market, and immedi- 
ately went to 118, giving the bankers and 
financiers a profit on the transaction of "$7,- 
000,000. Criticism of the President's Treas- 
ury policy, which had been constant and bit- 
ter, now rose, in some quarters, to a pitch of 
frenzy. 

[43] 



Debs and the Pullman Strike 

In the meantime, labor disturbances had 
broken out, for the panic of 1893 was fol- 
lowed by industrial stagnation. Throngs of 
the unemployed, augmented by vagabonds 
and tramps, roamed about the country. 
'*Coxey's army" straggled into Washington. 
There were strikes and lockouts in many in- 
dustries. In May, 1894, the Pullman Palace 
Car Company dismissed a part of its work- 
men, and reduced the wages of the remain- 
der. The men struck, and submitted a re- 
quest for arbitration, to which the 'Company 
replied, **We have nothing to arbitrate." 
The cause of the Pullman employees was 
taken up by the American Railway Union, 
an organization of about 150,000 railroad 
workers, with headquarters in Chicago. The 
president of the union was Eugene V. Debs, 
then a young man. A general railroad 
strike was called for June 26, and after that 
day switchmen refused to attach Pullman 
cars to any train, while engineers and crews 
refused to move any train in which Pullman 
cars were included. Within five days practi- 
cally every road running out of Chicago was 
tied up. The strike spread as far as the 
Pacific States, and passenger and mail 
trains to which Pullman cars were attached 
could not be moved. 

[44] 



At this juncture the Federal government 
intervened. Attorney-General Olney (after- 
ward made Secretary of State) directed 
United States counsel in Chicago to apply to 
the Federal courts for an injunction. The 
next day, July 1, Judge Woods issued a 
sweeping injunction forbidding Debs and 
the other officers of the Railway Union from 
interfering with the transportation of the 
mails and from obstructing interstate com- 
merce, and also forbidding them from at- 
tempting to persuade railroad employees to 
strike. There had been sporadic outbreaks 
of violence in the Chicago yards on June 30. 
The injunction aroused angry passions, and 
violence became general : cars were smashed 
and trains ditched. A marshal who read the 
injunction to the mob was hooted. On July 
3, the President ordered Federal troops to 
move into Chicago. Governor Altgeld of Illi- 
nois protested in two long telegrams against 
the use of Federal Troops, but President 
Cleveland curtly refused to heed his objec- 
tions. On July 7 the troops were given 
orders to shoot to kill. In clashes between 
the soldiers and the strikers during the next 
few days, members of the mob were killed. 
Violence ceased, and trains began to move. 
Debs and three of his associates were ar- 
rested, July 17, on a charge of contempt of 

[45] 



court. They refused to give bail. On De- 
cember 14, Debs was sentenced to six months 
in prison, and each of his associates to three 
months, on the charge of contempt. 

The action of the Federal government in 
this strike provoked, especially in labor cir- 
cles, a great deal of hostile comment. Many 
of the criticisms, however, missed the point. 
The President was well within his constitu- 
tional and legal rights in using the United 
States army to move the mails. Where the 
administration laid itself open to blame was 
in the abuse of the power of the Federal 
courts. It employed "government by injunc- 
tion," not merely to protect the mails and to 
suppress violence, but to break a strike with- 
out reference to the merits of the dispute. 
The President later appointed a Commis- 
sion, the members of which were Carrol D. 
Wright, John D. Kernan and Nicholas E. 
Worthington, to investigate the origin of the 
strike. In its report the Commission found 
less to censure in the conduct of the Railway 
Union than in the acts of its opponent, the 
Railway Managers' Association. 

The Venezuelan Crisis 

Only one action of Cleveland in his second 
term was greeted with general approval. 
That was his Venezuelan message. For 

[46] 



more than half a century Great Britain and 
Venezuela had been disputing over the 
boundary line of the colony of British Gui- 
ana. As early as 1876 Venezuela had ap- 
pealed to the government of the United 
States to interest itself in the matter. The 
question v^as historical and geographical, 
and a proper subject for the consideration of 
impartial experts. The South American re- 
public had pressed for arbitration, but Great 
Britain had adopted a policy of postpone- 
ment and delay. In the seventies rich de- 
posits of gold were discovered in the areas 
under dispute. These discoveries strength- 
ened the disinclination of Great Britain to 
submit the issue to arbitration, and further- 
more seemed to convince her that her pre- 
vious claims had been much too moderate. 
She put forth a series of new demands, 
which, had they been sustained, would have 
added several substantial strips of territory 
to her colony. In 1887 Venezuela had with- 
drawn its minister from London. The 
United States, thereafter, several times sug- 
gested to Great Britain that the boundary 
dispute be arbitrated, but without avail. 
Cleveland decided to bring the matter to a 
head. He feared not only an encroachment 
on Venezuela, but a violation of the Monroe 
Doctrine. In July, 1894, the Department of 

[47] 



state addressed a despatch to the British 
Foreign Office, once more urging arbitration. 
To this Lord Salisbury replied that "Her 
Majesty's Government could not consent to 
any departure from the Schomburgk line." 
The next American note was firmer in tone. 
Secretary of State Olney declared that the 
United States is "entitled to resent and re- 
sist any sequestration of Venezuelan soil by 
Great Britain." Salisbury waved this aside, 
with the remark that the Monroe Doctrine 
had "no foundation in the law of nations." 
Thereupon Cleveland sent to Congress his 
special message of December 17, 1895, which 
carried a hint of war. The President as- 
serted that it was incumbent upon the 
United States to determine, "with sufficient 
certainty for its justification, what is the 
true divisional line" between Venezuela and 
British Guiana. To this end he requested 
Congress to make — 

**an adequate appropriation for the ex- 
penses of a Commission to be appointed 
by the Executive, who shall make the 
necessary investigations, and report 
upon the matter with the least possible 
delay. When such a report is made and 
accepted, it will, in my opinion, be the 
duty of the United States to resist, by 
every means in its power, as a wilful 
aggression upon its rights and interests, 

[48] 



the appropriation by Great Britain of 
any lands, or the exercise of governmen- 
tal jurisdiction over any territory 
which, after investigation, we have de- 
termined of right belongs to Venezuela. 
In making these recommendations, I am 
fully alive to the responsibility incurred, 
and keenly realize all the consequences 
which may follow." 

In Congress this message was greeted 
with wild applause. An appropriation of 
$100,000 for the expenses of the boundary 
commission was passed at once. Through- 
out the country the President's bold stand 
brought an enthusiastic response. William 
McKinley, then Governor of Ohio, and be- 
ginning to bulk large as a Presidential pos- 
sibility, telegraphed: **The message is 
American in letter and spirit ; and, in a calm, 
dispassionate manner, upholds the honor of 
the nation and ensures its security." Only 
in certain academic and financial circles on 
the Eastern seaboard was the message 
viewed with displeasure. On the New York 
Stock Exchange there was a drop of $400,- 
000,000 in the value of American securities. 
But war did not come. After a period of 
cogitation the British government decided to 
submit the matter to arbitration, Schom- 
burgk line and all. A final award was ren- 
dered, in 1899, by an international commis- 

[49] 



sion sitting in Paris. The decision was in 
the nature of a compromise, and was re- 
garded as being, on the whole, not unfavor- 
able to Great Britain. 

Retirement Under Fire 

Notwithstanding Cleveland's promptness 
to resist anything that looked like aggres- 
sion, his foreign policy in general might be 
termed anti-imperialistic. At the very be- 
ginning of his second term he withdrew from 
the Senate a treaty for the annexation of 
Hawaii, because he believed that the revolt 
in the Islands had been engineered with the 
secret connivance of American officials; and 
for four years he held the annexationists at 
bay. Furtheraiore, he did what he could to 
stave off a war with Spain. He offered 
friendly mediation from time to time. Oth- 
erwise he maintained a strict neutrality. He 
enforced the laws against filibustering ex- 
peditions so rigidly that he incurred the hos- 
tility of American sympathizers with the 
Cuban insurrectionists. However, in his 
final message to Congress, transmitted in 
December, 1896, after General Weyler's con- 
centration order had been issued, he read 
Spain a plain warning. He said: 

"The United States is not a nation to 
which peace is a necessity. * * * 

[50] 



When the inability of Spain to deal suc- 
cessfully with the insurrection has be- 
come manifest and it is demonstrated 
that her sovereignty is extinct in Cuba 
for all purposes of its rightful existence, 
and when a hopeless struggle for its re- 
establishment has degenerated into a 
strife which means nothing more than 
the useless sacrifice of human life and 
the utter destruction of the very sub- 
ject-matter of the conflict, a situation 
will be presented in which our obliga- 
tions to the sovereignty of Spain will be 
superseded by higher obligations, which 
we can hardly hesitate to recognize and 
discharge." 

As Cleveland approached the end of his 
Presidential career he found himself the ob- 
ject of much ill-will. The South, the West, 
the North, had turned against him. The 
Congressional elections of 1894 had gone Re- 
publican by large majorities ; and the Repub- 
licans were jubilant over their prospects for 
1896. The Democratic Party had been cap- 
tured by the advocates of free silver, Cleve- 
land endeavored to rally the supporters of 
**honest money" within the Democratic 
ranks. "A cause worth fighting for," he 
said, **is worth fighting for to the end." But 
his efforts were futile. At the Democratic 
national convention which met at Chicago in 
June, 1896, Cleveland's name was not 

[51] 



cheered, and his administration was not en- 
dorsed. Cleveland afterwards said: *'Any 
man with even the smallest knowledge of the 
conditions which surrounded my second ad- 
ministration knows that I could not have 
commanded the support of half a dozen dele- 
gates in the whole country. The persistent 
misrepresentations of personal enemies, the 
falsehood and partisan denunciations pub- 
lished in the Republican press, betrayal by 
the advocates of free silver, and resistance 
to the declaration of war with Spain, had 
combined to make my administration one of 
the most unpopular in our history.'* There 
were other causes for discontent: the bond 
sales, the use of the Federal injunction 
against labor, low wages and unemploy- 
ment. The man's great services were forgot- 
ten, and he was blamed for everything and 
anything. The Democrats nominated Bryan ; 
and the Republicans swept triumphantly 
into office behind McKinley on a platform of 
high protectionism and gold monometalism. 
On March 5, 1897, Cleveland retired 
finally from public life, and went to live in 
Princeton, New Jersey. He was made a 
trustee of Princeton University. He made 
occasional speeches to the undergraduates, 
and for a time delivered two lectures a year. 
There he wrote two books, "Presidential 

[52] 



Problems,'* and ''Fishing and Shooting 
Sketches.'' He consistently refused, how- 
ever, to prepare an autobiography. He ab- 
stained from participation in public aifairs, 
except to give his endorsement, from time to 
time, to the conservative wing of the Demo- 
cratic party. In 1905 he became one of a 
board of three trustees to administer the 
majority of the stock of the Equitable Life 
Assurance Company of New York. He did 
much to restore the confidence of the public, 
shaken by revelations of gross mismanage- 
ment, in the great insurance companies. He 
was engaged in this work at the time he was 
stricken with his last illness. He died at his 
home in Princeton, June 24, 1908, at the age 
of 71. The funeral, in conformity with his 
wishes, was simple, and was attended only 
by relatives and intimate friends. Presi- 
dent Roosevelt, in announcing his death to 
the country, said : "The nation has been de- 
prived of one of its greatest citizens." 

Personal Characteristics 

In physical appearance Cleveland belonged 
to the plain, hearty, dependable-looking type. 
In a large head were set blue eyes, strong 
nose and jaw, and a firm mouth. He was a 
heavy man; most of his life he was corpu- 
lent. His height was an inch or two under 

[53] 



six feet. In Buffalo and Albany he had a 
stolid look, and something of a slouch. As 
he grew older his bearing took on more dig- 
nity, and his face more force. In his elder 
years he looked seamed and rugged. 

His health and digestion were excellent. 
He had no nerves; there was not a hint of 
the neurotic about him. In 1893 a serious 
operation was secretly performed on the roof 
of his mouth, while he was aboard the yacht 
of his friend Commodore E. C. Benedict, in 
New York harbor. He stood the strain so 
well and recuperated so rapidly that no one 
outside of a small circle of intimates sus- 
pected the President's condition. A pro- 
digious worker, he was also an ardent sports- 
man. He was particularly fond of fishing 
and of duck-hunting. While President he 
often went up the Potomac for bass or 
down the Bay for bluefish. He arranged his 
vacations so he could be out-of-doors most of 
the time : in the Adirondacks, in the South- 
ern uplands, or on the coast. In the interim 
between his first and second terms as Pres- 
ident he purchased a house, "Gray Gables," 
at Buzzard's Bay, Massachusetts, where he 
found the fishing good. This was thereafter 
his summer home. 

Cleveland's manner usually was reserved 
and quiet; sometimes it verged on shyness. 

[54] 



He eschewed all affectations. He was ordi- 
narily simple and cordial, but he did not 
coddle people. He was a good listener, and 
when he was not sympathetic with his 
caller's views he listened to the point of 
painfulness, letting the other man do all the 
talking. He could be frigid on occasion. He 
once told a young man who insisted on hav- 
ing his opinion : "That, sir, is a matter of too 
great importance to discuss in a five-minute 
interview, now rapidly drawing to its close.'* 
If he ever found that a man had lied to him, 
he never trusted that man again. In a con- 
ference with Boss Croker of Tammany Hall 
he lost his temper and pounded the table. 
And this was not the only time in his life 
when he spoke his views with energy. How- 
ever, he was not addicted to profanity or 
slang; and there was a touch of quality in 
all he said. 

With children he was kindly and friendly ; 
he had a soft place in his heart for all little 
ones. He was happy in his home circle. 
Many episodes in his life betray a graceful 
courtesy. One of his first acts when he be- 
came President in 1885 was to restore the 
impoverished Grant to full rank and pay 
as general. On the last day that he was 
President, in 1897, he had a long, amicable 
conversation with McKinley on pending 

[55] 



problems. He wished the incoming Re- 
publican President a successful administra- 
tion, and expressed the hope that when he 
left the White House he would not be so glad 
as his predecessor to lay down the burden. 

Cleveland never went abroad; apparently 
he had little desire to see the world. His 
only excursion outside the United States was 
a trip to Bermuda when a lawyer in Buffalo. 
Likewise there were certain mental frontiers 
that his mind seldom crossed. He had 
scant curiosity about literature, music or 
art. His reading was confined largely to 
American history and biography. He has 
left us no great orations, and also no cheap 
declamations, although he had opportunities : 
the unveiling of the Statue of Liberty, the 
opening of the Brooklyn Bridge, the funeral 
of General Grant. Many of his state papers 
are still readable. His fondness for heavy 
platitude would have been irksome had it 
not been relieved often by a sly play of 
humor. The care that he took to master a 
subject is evidenced in the cogency of his 
reasoning. Whatever the limitations of his 
mind, he at least possessed that one quality 
which is the surest guide to truth: intellec- 
tual integrity. He was willing to follow 
wherever the facts seemed to lead. He 
wrote everything carefully, making numer- 

[56] 



ous drafts and revisions. His style tended 
at times to be elaborate and turgid, but it 
was seldom without flashes of vigor. 

Some of Cleveland's phrases were long re- 
membered and widely quoted, especially: 
"innocuous desuetude," "offensive parti- 
sans," "pernicious activity," and "the restless 
rich." When candidate for mayor in Buf- 
falo, Cleveland said : "Public officials are the 
trustees of the people." This was one of the 
many echoes of Henry Clay's declaration, 
made in 1829: "Government is a trust, and 
the officers of the government are trustees; 
and both the trust and the trustees are 
created for the benefit of the people." In a 
shorter form, — "Public office is a public 
trust," — this sentiment was long employed 
as a slogan by Cleveland's campaign mana- 
gers. It did good service, because it applied. 

Some of the more pungent of Cleveland's 
sentences were these: 

"Party honesty is party expediency." 

"It is a condition which confronts us, not 
a theory." 

"Though the people support the govern- 
ment, the government should not support the 

people." 

Political Philosophy 

Everyone, it is safe to say, has some sort 
of a social philosophy, some theory of the 

[57] 



state, some ideal of political and economic 
justice. Most of us, of course, accept the 
beliefs and assumptions which are current 
in our country and in our age, as natural 
and sound. And so it was with Cleveland; 
his social and economic philosophy was to 
some extent conventional, and to some ex- 
tent unformulated. His was not a specula- 
tive turn of mind. He was the opposite of 
the doctrinnaire ; certainly he had no gen- 
eral schemes for the remaking of society. 
Many of his acts and utterances seemed to 
show a strong bias toward conservatism ; for 
example, his stand in the Pullman strike. 
When Governor of New York he found oc- 
casion to remark: **It is manifestly im- 
portant that invested capital should be pro- 
tected." On the other hand he often called 
vested interests sharply to account. In one 
of his messages to Congress (December 3, 
1888), he wrote: 

"Communism is a hateful thing and 
a menace to peace and organized gov- 
ernment; but the communism of com- 
bined wealth and capital, the outgrowth 
of overweening cupidity and selfishness, 
which insidiously undermine the justice 
and integrity of free institutions, is not 
less dangerous than the communism of 
oppressed poverty and toil, which, ex- 
asperated by injustice and discontent, 

[58] 



attacks with wild disorder the citadel 
of rule." 

To attempt to label this man of action as 
one thing or another in the terms of political 
abstraction, is quite to miss the point. His 
doctrine was essentially individual and 
moral, and the direct outgrowth of his tem- 
perament and character. He himself was 
honest and downright in private business, 
and equally honest and downright in public 
affairs. His rule for statesmanship can, in 
its elements, be found in the two following 
quotations : 

**There is surely no difference in his 
duties and obligations, whether a person 
is entrusted with the money of one man 
or many; and yet it sometimes appears 
as though the office holder assumes that 
a different rule of fidelity prevails be- 
tween him and the taxpayers than that 
which should regulate his conduct, 
when, as an individual, he holds the 
money of his neighbors." 

And again: 

"An absolute and undivided responsi- 
bility on the part of the appointing 
power accords with correct business 
principles, the application of which to 
public affairs will always, I believe, 
direct the way to good administration 
and the protection of the people's in- 
terests." 

[59] 



To preach and moralize is ever easy; and 
nearly all public men are dripping with lofty 
sentiments. Cleveland distinguished himself 
by meaning what he said. To every office he 
gave the best that was in him: a thorough, 
painstaking, scrupulous administration. He 
did what he could, further, to balk and 
thwart the designs of selfish and greedy 
politicians. He could say *'No" often, final- 
ly, and convincingly. His twenty-one pre- 
decessors in the Presidential chair sent to 
Congress, altogether, about one hundred and 
fifty vetoes. During his first term alone 
Cleveland sent in over three hundred vetoes. 
His unflagging industry enabled him to de- 
tect intrigue and fraud where it would have 
escaped the attention of a more easy-going 
Chief Executive; and he set his face like 
flint against all sharpers, big and little. 

Is it merely negative to say Thou Shalt 
Not? Is there no affirmation in resistance 
to evil ? Resistance can do this much : it can 
stop the leaks in the public treasury, and re- 
turn to the people millions of acres of public 
lands. It can transform the Monroe Doc- 
trine from an expression of opinion into a 
principle of international law. It can lift a 
man out of the ruck and give him an honor- 
able name for all time. And it can refresh 
the spirits of citizens, and help to restore a 
waning faith in republics. 

[60] 



Public Utterances 
II 

The following quotations, dealing with a 
variety of topics, are taken from Grower 
Cleveland's public addresses. The reader 
may not, in all instances, agree with the 
opinions expressed; but from a perusal of 
these passages he can gain a definite im- 
pression of Cleveland's style of composition, 
his humor, his good sense, and his argu- 
mentative force. 

THE NEGRO PROBLEM 

(Address to Southern Educational Association, New York City, 
April 14, 1903.) 

I believe that the days of "Uncle Tom's 
Cabin" are passed. I believe that neither 
the decree that made the slaves free, nor the 
enactment that suddenly invested them with 
the rights of citizenship any more purged 
them of their racial and slavery-bred imper- 
fections and deficiencies than it changed the 
color of their skins. 

I believe that among the nearly nine mil- 
lions of negroes who have intermixed with 
our citizenship there is still a grievous 
amount of ignorance, a sad amount of vi- 
ciousness and a tremendous amount of lazi- 

[61] 



ness and thriftlessness. I believe that these 
conditions inexorably present to the white 
people of the United States — to each in his 
environment and under the mandate of good 
citizenship — a problem, which neither en- 
lightened self-interest nor the higher motive 
of human sympathy will permit them to put 
aside. 

I believe our fellow-countrymen in the 
Southern and late slave-holding States, sur- 
rounded by about nine-tenths, or nearly 
eight millions, of this entire negro popula- 
tion, and who regard their material pros- 
perity, their peace, and even the safety of 
their civilization, interwoven with the negro 
problem, are entitled to our utmost consid- 
eration and sympathetic fellowship. I am 
thoroughly convinced that the efforts of 
Booker Washington and the methods of Tus- 
kegee Institute point the way to a safe and 
beneficent solution of the vexatious negro 
problem at the South; and I know that the 
good people at the North, who have aided 
these efforts and methods, have illustrated 
the highest and best citizenship and the most 
Christian and enlightened philanthropy. 

I cannot, however, keep out of my mind to- 
night the thought that, with all we of the 
North may do, the realization of our hopes 
for the negro must, after all, mainly depend, 

[62] 



except so far as it rests with the negroes 
themselves, upon the sentiment and conduct 
of the leading and responsible white men of 
the South, and upon the maintenance of a 
kindly and helpful feeling on their part to- 
ward those in their midst who so much need 
their aid and encouragement. 

I do not know how it may be with other 
Northern friends of the negro, but I have 
faith in the honor and sincerity of the re- 
spectable white people of the South in their 
relations with the negro and his improve- 
ment and well being. They do not believe in 
the social equality of the race, and they make 
no false pretense in regard to it. That this 
does not grow out of hatred of the negro is 
very plain. It seems to me that there are 
abundant sentiment and abundant behavior 
among the Southern whites toward the negro 
to make us doubt the justice of charging this 
denial of social equality to prejudice, as we 
usually understand the word. Perhaps it is 
born of something so much deeper and more 
imperious than prejudice as to amount to a 
radical instinct. Whatever it is, let us re- 
member that it had condoned the negro's 
share in the humiliation and spoliation of the 
white men of the South during the saturna- 
lia of reconstruction days, and has allowed a 
kindly feeling for the negro to survive the 

[63] 



time when the South was deluged by the per- 
ilous flood of indiscriminate, unintelligent 
and blighting negro suffrage. Whatever it 
is, let us try to be tolerant and considerate 
of the feelings and even the prejudice or 
radical instinct of our white fellow-country- 
men of the South who, in the solution of the 
negro problem must, amid their own sur- 
roundings, bear the heat of the day and stag- 
ger under the weight of the white man's bur- 
den. 

DOCTORS AND LAWYERS 

(Address to the Medical Alumni Association, New York City, 
February 15, 1890.) 

I have no doubt that it is very funny for 
people to caricature doctors as playing into 
the hands of undertakers, and to represent 
lawyers as being on such good terms with the 
evil one as to preclude the least chance of 
their salvation. Those who indulge in this 
sort of merriment are well people and people 
who have no lawsuits on hand. They grow 
very serious when their time comes and they 
grow sick or are caught in the meshes of the 
law. Then they are very respectful and very 
appreciative of our skill and learning. If 
sick they would fain have the doctor by their 
side day and night; and if they are troubled 
with a lawsuit they sit like Mordecai at the 
lawyer's gate and are unwilling that he 

[64] 



should attend to any business but theirs. 
They are ready to lay their fortunes at our 
feet and to give and promise all things if 
they can but recover their health or win their 
suit. These are the days in which the law- 
yer, if he is wise, will suggest to his clients 
the payment of a round retainer or a fee in 
advance. I mention this as indicating a dif- 
ference at this time in our situations in fa- 
vor of the lawyer which gives him a slight 
advantage over his medical brother. 

When the patient recovers, or the client 
has succeeded in his suit, the old hardihood 
and impenitence return. The patient insists 
that his strong constitution carried him 
through, and the client declares that he al- 
ways knew there was nothing in the case 
of his adversary. They haggle over our bills 
and wonder how we can charge so much for 
so little work. 

But sometimes the life or the lawsuit can- 
not be saved. In such a case we must not 
overlook a difference in our situations, with 
features in favor of the doctor. The de- 
feated client is left in a vigorous and active 
condition, not only in the complete enjoy- 
ment of his ancient privilege of swearing at 
the Court, but also with full capacity to 
swear at his lawyer. The defeated patient, 
on the contrary, is very quiet indeed and can 

[65] 



only swear at his doctor if he has left his 
profanity in a phonograph to be ground out 
by his executor. 

A point of resemblance between us is 
found in the fact that in neither profession 
do we manage well in treating our own cases. 
Doctors solemnly advise their patients that 
it is dangerous to eat this or drink that, or 
do many other things which make existence 
pleasant ; and after marking out a course for 
their poor patients which, if followed, robs 
life of all which makes it worth living, they 
hasten away to tempt instant death, accord- 
ing to their own teachings, by filling them- 
selves with all the good things and indul- 
gence within the reach of their desires. So 
the lawyer, safe and wise when he counsels 
others, deals so poorly with his own legal 
affairs as to have originated the saying that 
a lawyer who tries his own case has a fool 
for a client; and it seems almost impossible 
for a lawyer to draw his own will in such 
manner as not to yield a passage through 
it for a coach and four. 

THE USES OF EX-PRESIDENTS 

(Address to the New York Chamber of Commerce, 
November 19, 1889.) 

There has been much discussion lately con- 
cerning the disposition which should be made 
of our ex-Presidents, and many plans have 

1661 



been suggested for putting us out of the way. 
I am sure we are very sorry to make so much 
trouble, but I do hope that, whatever con- 
clusion may be reached, the recommendation 
of a Kentucky newspaper editor, to take us 
out and shoot us, will not be adopted. Prior 
to the 4th day of last March I did not appre- 
ciate as well as I do now the objections to 
this proceeding, but I have had time to re- 
flect upon the subject since and I find excel- 
lent reasons for opposing this plan. 

(Address to Neighbors, Sandwich, Mass., July 25, 1891.) 

It must be admitted that our people are by 
no means united in their ideas concerning the 
place which our ex-Presidents ought to oc- 
cupy, or the disposition which should be 
made of them. Of course, the subject would 
be relieved of all uncertainty and embarrass- 
ment if every President would die at the end 
of his term. This does not seem, however, 
to meet the views of those who under such 
an arrangement would be called on to do the 
dying; and so some of them continue to live, 
and thus perpetuate the perplexity of those 
who burden themselves with plans for their 
utilization or disposition. 

A very amusing class among these anxious 
souls make us useful by laying upon our 
shoulders all sorts of political conspiracies. 

[67] 



If they are to be believed, we are constantly 
engaged in plotting for our own benefit and 
advancement, and are quite willing, for the 
sake of reaching our ends, not only to de- 
stroy the party to which we belong, but to 
subvert popular liberty and utterly uproot 
our free American institutions. Others seem 
of the opinion that we should be utilized as 
orators at county fairs and other occasions 
of all sorts and at all sorts of places. Some 
think we should interfere in every political 
contest, and should be constantly in readi- 
ness to express an opinion on every subject 
of a political character that anybody has the 
ingenuity to suggest. Others still regard it 
as simply dreadful for us to do these things, 
and are greatly disturbed every time an ex- 
President ventures to express an opinion on 
any subject. Not a few appear to think we 
should simply exist and be blind, deaf, and 
dumb the remainder of our days. 

In the midst of all this a vast majority of 
the plain American people are, as usual, 
sound and sensible. They are self-respecting 
enough and have dignity enough to appre- 
ciate the fact that their respect and confi- 
dence as neighbors is something which an ex- 
President may well covet, and which, like any 
other man, he ought to earn. 

[68] 



THE EDUCATED MAN IN POLITICS 

(Address at Harvard University, November 9, 1886.) 

If the fact is recalled that only twelve of 
my twenty-one precedessors in office had the 
advantage of a collegiate or university edu- 
cation, a proof is presented of the democratic 
sense of our people, rather than an argument 
against the supreme value of the best and 
most liberal education in high public posi- 
tions. There certainly can be no sufficient 
reason for any space or distance between the 
walks of a most classical education and the 
way that leads to a political place. Any dis- 
inclination on the part of the most learned 
and cultured of our citizens to mingle in pub- 
lic affairs, and the consequent abandonment 
of political activity to those who have but 
little regard for student and scholar in poli- 
tics, are not favorable conditions under a gov- 
ernment such as ours, and if they have ex- 
isted to a damaging extent, very recent 
events appear to indicate that the education 
and conservatism of the land are to be here- 
after more plainly heard in the expression 
of the popular will. 

Surely the splendid destiny which awaits 
a patriotic effort in behalf of our country 
will be sooner reached if the best of our 
thinkers and educated men shall deem it a 
solemn duty of citizenship to engage actively 

[69] 



and practically in political affairs, and if the 
force and power of their thought and learn- 
ing shall be willingly or unwillingly acknowl- 
edged in party management. . . . 

After all, it comes to this: The people of 
the United States have one and all a sacred 
mission to perform, and your President, not 
more surely than any other citizen who loves 
his country, must assume part of the re- 
sponsibility of the demonstration to the 
world of the success of popular government. 
No man can hide his talent in a napkin, and 
escape the condemnation which his slothful- 
ness deserves, or evade the stern sentence 
which his faithlessness invites. 

ADVICE TO UNDERGRADUATES 

(Address at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 
February 22, 1892.) 

I beg you, therefore, to take with you, when 
you go forth to assume the obligations of 
American citizenship, as one of the best gifts 
of your Alma Mater, a strong and abiding 
faith in the value and potency of a good con- 
science and a pure heart. Never yield one 
iota to those who teach that these are weak 
and childish things, not needed in the strug- 
gle of manhood with the stern realities of 
life. Interest yourselves in public affairs as 
a duty of citizenship; but do not surrender, 
your faith to those who discredit and debase 

[70] 



politics by scoffing at sentiment and princi- 
ple, and whose political activity consists in 
attempts to gain popular support by cunning 
devices and shrewd manipulation. You will 
find plenty of these who will smile at your 
profession of faith, and tell you that truth 
and virtue and honesty and goodness were 
well enough in the old days when Washing- 
ton lived, but are not suited to the present 
size and development of our country and the 
progress we have made in the art of political 
management. Be steadfast. The strong and 
sturdy oak still needs the support of its na- 
tive earth, and, as it grows in size and 
spreading branches, its roots must strike 
deeper in the soil which warmed and fed its 
first tender sprout. You will be told that 
the people have no longer any desire for the 
things you profess. Be not deceived. The 
people are not dead, but sleeping. They will 
awaken in good time, and scourge the money- 
changers from their sacred temple. 

You may be chosen to public office. Do not 
shrink from it, for holding office is also a 
duty of citizenship. But do not leave your 
faith behind you. Every public office, small 
or great, is held in trust for your fellow-citi- 
zens. They differ in importance, in responsi- 
bility, and in the labor they impose ; but the 
duties of none of them can be well performed 

[71] 



if the mentorship of a good conscience and 
pure heart be discarded. Of course, other 
equipment is necessary, but without this 
mentorship all else is insufficient. In times 
of gravest responsibility it will solve your 
difficulties; in the most trying hour it will 
lead you out of perplexities, and it will, at 
all times, deliver you from temptation. 



[72] 



Correspondence 
III 

Some of the letters written by Grover 
Cleveland, particularly when the writer was 
moved by emotion or sentiment, have a 
pungency of statement and a felicity of 
phrasing not always present in his other 
compositions. Cleveland wrote many letters, 
at all stages of his career; but unfortunately 
the greater bulk of his correspondence has 
not so far been collected and printed. Of 
the letters which have been published the 
following are especially notable. 



TO HIS BROTHER WILLIAM ON THE EVE OF 
HIS ELECTION AS GOVERNOR 

Buffalo, N. Y., November 7, 1882. 
My Dear Brother: 

I have just voted. I sit here in the mayor's 
office alone, with the exception of an artist 
from Frank Leslie's newspaper, who is 
sketching the office. If mother was here I 
should be writing to her, and I feel as if it 
were time for me to write to someone who 
will believe what I write. 

[73] 



I have been for some time in the atmos- 
phere of certain success, so that I have been 
sure that I should assume the duties of the 
high office for which I have been named. I 
have tried hard, in the light of this fact, to 
appreciate properly the responsibilities that 
will rest upon me, and they are much, too 
much, underestimated. But the thought that 
has troubled me is, can I well perform my 
duties, and in such a manner as to do some 
good to the people of the State? I know 
there is room for it, and I know that I am 
honest and sincere in my desire to do well; 
but the question is whether I know enough 
to accomplish what I desire. 

The social life which seems to await me 
has also been a subject of much anxious 
thought. I have a notion that I can regulate 
that very much as I desire; and, if I can, I 
shall spend very little time in the purely 
ornamental part of the office. In point of 
fact, I will tell you, first of all others, the 
policy I intend to adopt, and that is, to make 
the matter a business engagement between 
the people of the State and myself, in which 
the obligation on my side is to perform the 
duties assigned me with an eye single to the 
interest of my employers. I shall have no 
idea of reelection, or any higher political 
preferment in my head, but be very thankful 

[74] 



and happy if I can well serve one term as the 
people's Governor. Do you know that if 
mother were alive, I should feel so much 
safer? I have always thought that her 
prayers had much to do with my success. I 
shall expect you all to help me in that way. 
Your affectionate brother, 

(Prober Clebelanb. 



TO A POLITICIAN WHO HAD ENDORSED A 
WORTHLESS OFFICE SEEKER 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, August 1, 1885. 
Dear Sir : 

I have read your letter with amazement 
and indignation. There is one — but one — 
mitigation to the perfidy which your letter 
discloses, and that is found in the fact you 
confess your share in it. I don't know 
whether you are a Democrat or not, but if 
you are the crime which you confess is the 
more unpardonable. 

The idea that this administration, pledged 
to give the people better officers and en- 
gaged in a hand-to-hand fight with the bad 
elements of both parties, should be betrayed 
by those who ought to be worthy of implicit 
trust, is atrocious, and such treason to the 
people and to the party ought to be punished 
by imprisonment. 

[75] 



Your confession comes too late to be of 
immediate use to the public service, and I 
can only say that, while this is not the first 
time I have been deceived and misled by 
lying and treacherous representations, you 
are the first one that has so frankly owned 
his grievous fault. If any comfort is to be 
extracted from this assurance you are wel- 
come to it. 

(Prober Clebelanb. 



TO MRS. HENRY WARD BEECHER ON THE 
DEATH OF HER HUSBAND 

Executive Mansion, 
Washington, D. C, May 22, 1888. 
My Dear Mrs. Beecher: 

I have been asked to furnish a contribu- 
tion to a proposed memorial of your late 
husband. 

While I am by no means certain that any- 
thing I might prepare would be worthy of a 
place among the eloquent and beautiful 
tributes which are sure to be presented, this 
request spurs to action my desire and inten- 
tion to express to you, more fully than I have 
yet done, my sympathy in your affliction and 
my appreciation of my own and the coun- 
try's loss in the death of Mr. Beecher. 

[76] 



More than thirty years ago I repeatedly 
enjoyed the opportunity of hearing him in 
his own pulpit. His warm utterances, and 
the earnest interest he displayed in the 
practical things related to useful living, the 
hopes he inspired, and the manner in which 
he relieved the precepts of Christianity from 
gloom and cheerlessness, made me feel that, 
though a stranger, he was my friend. Many 
years afterward we came to know each 
other; and since that time my belief in his 
friendship, based upon acquaintance and 
personal contact, has been to me a source of 
the greatest satisfaction. 

Your personal affliction in his death 
stands alone, in its magnitude and depth. 
But thousands wish that their sense of loss 
might temper your grief, and that they, by 
sharing your sorrow, might lighten it. 

Such kindly assurances, and your realiza- 
tion of the high and sacred mission accom- 
plished in your husband's useful life, fur- 
nish all this world can supply of comfort; 
but your faith and piety will not fail to lead 
you to a higher and better source of consola- 
tion. 

Yours very sincerely, 

(Prober Clebelanb. 

[77] 



TO RICHARD WATSON GILDER ABOUT AN" 
AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

Princeton, N. J., Jan. 28, 1905. 

... I honestly think, my dear Gilder, that 
there are things in my life and career that 
if set out, and read by the young men of our 
country, might be of benefit to a generation 
soon to have in their keeping the safety and 
the mission of our nation ; but I am not cer- 
tain of this, for I am by no means sure that 
it would be in tune with the vaudeville that 
attracts our people and wins their applause. 
Somehow I don't want to appear wearing a 
fur coat in July. 

Mr. and all the forces about him 

have lately importuned me, in season and 
out of season, to write, say, 12 autobio- 
graphical articles, offering what seems to me 
a large sum for them; but I have declined 
the proposition. I went so far (for I soften- 
ed up a bit under the suggestion of duty and 
money) , to inquire how something would do 
like talking to another person for publica- 
tion; but that did not take at all. I don't 
really think I would have done even that, but 
the disapproval of merely a hint that the '*I" 
might to an extent be eliminated, made it 
seem to me more than ever, that the reten- 
tion of everything that might attract the 

[78] 



lovers of a "snappy life" was considered 
important by the would-be publisher. 

There is a circle of friends like you, who 
I hope will believe in me. I am happy in 
the conviction that they will continue in the 
faith whether an autobiography is written 
or not. I want my wife and children to love 
me now, and hereafter to proudly honor my 
memory. They will have my autobiography 
written on their hearts where every day they 
may turn the pages and read it. In these 
days what else is there that is worth while 
to a man nearly sixty-eight years old? 
Yours faithfully, 

(Prober Clebelanb. 

("Grover Cleveland: A Record of Friendship." 
By Richard Watson Gilder.) 



[79] 



Anecdotes and Estimates 
IV 

As supplementary to a chronological re- 
view of a man's career, the recital of typical 
episodes in his life, about affairs both im- 
portant and incidental, is often valuable in 
helping us to round out the picture. The 
anecdotes of friends, and the estimates of 
contemporaries, carry the flavor and color of 
personality. The following quotations are 
drawn from various sources, and are repro- 
duced here partly because they are interest- 
ing in themselves, and partly because they 
illusty^ate salient features of Cleveland's 
character. In each case the authorship is 
recorded at the end of the quotation. 



Mckinley's assassination 
On the afternoon that President McKinley 
was shot at Buffalo, he was fishing with a 
friend in a small lake in the Berkshires. At 
about sunset a man was seen rowing rapidly 
out towards the ex-President's boat. *'Mr. 
Cleveland, Mr. Cleveland," he shouted as he 
drew within call, "President McKinley has 
been assassinated!'* 

[80] 



The ex-President did not start; he simply- 
looked at the stranger, too much amazed by 
this bolt out of the blue to say anything. The 
man came nearer. **I tell you," he repeated, 
panting from his rapid rowing, *' President 
McKinley has been shot — killed!" 

Mr. Cleveland scrutinized the stranger a 
moment in grave silence, betraying nothing 
of what he thought or felt. Then making 
a sign to show that he had heard and ap- 
preciated what the man wished to say, his 
gaze dropped to his line again, though of 
course he was not thinking of fishing now. 
The bearer of bad tidings looked at the ap- 
parently stolid figure of the silent fisherman. 
"You don't seem to be much excited about 
it," he muttered, and putting about rowed 
slowly to shore. . . . 

Later, when Mr. McKinley died, the whole 
world, including, no doubt, the stranger in 
the rowboat, was surprised and touched at 
the depth of feeling shown by this rugged 
old statesman in his public utterance con- 
cerning the Nation's great calamity. 

("Mr. Cleveland: A Personal Impression." 
By Jesse Lynch Williams.) 



BREAKING IT BLUNTLY 

He spoke of a certain large city where he 
had appointed a good postmaster. The ques- 
tion was on the assistant postmaster. A 

[81] 



tremendous effort was made to have him ap- 
point the local Democratic boss, the kind of 
boss, as he believed, who represented the 
most venal elements in both of the great 
parties. They sent on a delegation consist- 
ing of the postmaster himself, and some men 
who were classed as the President's friends. 
The ex-governor of the State, also a political 
friend, came, and either in that or another 
conversation alone pressed the appointment 
upon him very hard. The President told 
him he was surprised that the ex-governor 
should give in to such a request; the answer 
was that the candidate had played so fair in 
the election, had done so well, that although 
there had been no promises, they felt it was 
only just to recognize his services; a good 
thing for the party, etc. 

"When the delegation had finished speak- 
ing, I looked out of the window a while, then 
said : 'Gentlemen : Blank Blank will never in 
any circumstances be appointed assistant 
postmaster of Blank.' Then I looked out of 
the window again." 

("Grover Cleveland: A Record of Friendship." 
By Richard Watson Gilder.) 



A SILLY ASS SEEKS A FAVOR 

Cleveland was most satisfactory as presi- 
dent in his quick and decisive judgment upon 

[82] 



matters presented to him. There were no 
delays, no revisions; in fact, no diplomatic 
methods of avoiding a disagreeable decision. 
He told you in the briefest time and in the 
cleverest way what he would do. 

A great social leader and arbiter in social 
affairs in New York was very desirious that 
the president should reverse his judgment in 
regard to an appointment affecting a mem- 
ber of his family. I gave him a letter which 
procured him a personal and confidential in- 
terview. When he came back to me he said : 
''That is the most extraordinary man I ever 
saw. After he had heard me through, he 
said he understood the matter thoroughly 
and would not change his opinion or action. 
He has no social position and never had. I 
tried to present its attractions and my abil- 
ity to help him in that regard, but he only 
laughed ; yes, he positively laughed." 

("My Memories of Eighty Years," 
By Chauncey M. Depew.) 



THE VENEZUELAJSr MESSAGE 

Just before its transmission — and after the 

final settlement of its form with the official 

most interested — the President began to 

read it to a member close to him in personal 

confidence as well as in direct interest 

When the reading was completed, the Presi- 

[83] 



dent turned to his listener and asked : "Now, 
what do you think of it?" and getting the 
reply, "It seems to me that, towards the end, 
it is just a little bit tart," he said quickly, 
shaking his head as he always did when he 
wanted to put peculiar emphasis upon any- 
thing, "That is just what I intended." 

("Recollections of Grover Cleveland." 
By George F. Parker.) 



ON THE FALL RIVER BOAT 

I never saw him have to repel familiarity 
except once. This was one evening on the 
deck of a Fall River boat, when a stranger 
broke into a group about the ex-President, 
with words he would not have uttered had 
he been in a condition to realize their im- 
pertinence. Mr. Cleveland suddenly raised 
his voice in a single vibrant sentence; and 
the episode soon came to an end. 

Wherever he went there was apt to be a 
crowd — even when he was not President — 
and always a friendly one. At times on the 
dock at Fall River there would be a rush 
upon him of hundreds of people, some of 
whom seemed determined, at least, to touch 
him, when there was not time or opportu- 
nity to shake hands. He was always good- 
natured about it, and particularly glad to 
shake hands with workingmen. On the boat 

[84] 



he would try to get to our state-rooms first, 
and if there was a choice, he would take pos- 
session of the least comfortable room him- 
self, and could not be dislodged. 

("Grover Cleveland: A Record of Friendship," 
By Richard Watson Gilder.) 



FISHING WITH JOSEPH JEFFERSON 

Former President Cleveland and Jefferson 
were great friends and frequent compan- 
ions in fishing excursions. This mutual pref- 
erence for the same sport ripened the in- 
timacy between them In their fishing 

jaunts there were rules implied and ex- 
pressed. There was ''the hour limit," for 
example. The boat once anchored remained 
so, no matter what fortune attended, for at 
least the space of an hour. Conversation 
might always be interrupted abruptly for 
good fishing, but under no circumstances, it 
is related, could good fishing be interrupted 

for conversation One of a party with 

Cleveland and Jefferson recounts that, the 
preparations for departure being nearly 
complete, Jefferson set off on a discussion of 
telepathic influence. As he halted for a sec- 
ond, Mr. Cleveland interrupted with: 

"That's all right, but where's the bait?" 

Francis Wilson ; Scribner's Magazine ; 
February, 1906.) 

[85] 



A JOKE ON HIMSELF 

Once "while in Washington," to use the 
ex-President's phrase for being President, 
he brought home a number of wild swans 
he had shot down South, and sent one as a 
compliment to each member of his Cabinet 
and to some of his other associates. "Well, 
all the boys thanked me politely for remem- 
bering them, but none of them seemed to 
have much to say about how they enjoyed 
the birds. Carlisle, I found, had his cooked 
on a night when he was dining out. An- 
other, when I asked him, said he hoped I 
wouldn't mind, but he had sent it home to 
his old mother. Thurber didn't mention his 
bird at all for two days. Finally I asked 
him about it. 'Thurber, did you get that 
swan all right?' 

" *Yes, sir, oh, yes, I got the swan all 
right, thank you,' and he bent over his desk, 
and seemed to be very busy. 

" Tine bird,' I said. 

" 'Yes, sir, fine bird,' and went on working. 

" 'Enjoy eating him, Thurber?' 

"He waited a minute, then he said — 'Well, 
sir, I guess they didn't cook him right at my 
house. They cooked him only two days,' and 
he went on working without cracking a 
smile." 

("Mr. Cleveland: A Personal Impression." 
By Jesse Lynch Williams.) 

[86] 



LONG PAST MIDNIGHT 
It SO happened once that, as I looked 
across the hall to the half-open door turned 
toward mine, I saw, reflected upon its pol- 
ished surface, the hand of a man busily- 
writing. I knew that this door opened into 
the workroom of Grover Cleveland, Presi- 
dent of the United States, whom I had not 
seen since taking up my hard task inside 
his official residence. So the habit was 
formed, when I went early to my daily task, 
of asking the watchman at what hour the 
President had knocked off the preceding 
night. I found that it was generally about 
three o'clock in the morning; now and then, 
when he had finished some severe task that 
he had set himself, he would stop at two 
o'clock. My only personal knowledge, of 
course, was, in general, up to one o'clock. 
I did keep at it, once or twice, until two, in 
the hope that I might rival the man next 
door, of whose greediness for work I had 
heard and of which I now had abundant 
knowledge. 

("Recollections of Grover Cleveland." 
By George F. Parker.) 



TILDEN^S JIBE 



This habit of personal attention to all the 
detailed work of his office he accomplished 

[87] 



only by denying himself the sleep which a 
man of more nervous organization would 
have imperatively required. . . . How 
far this habit was due to supereminent con- 
scientiousness, how far to temperament, it 
is difficult to say. Mr. Tilden evidently at- 
tributed it to temperament. ''What kind of 
a man is this Cleveland?" he was once 
asked. "Oh," was the reply, in that thin, 
squeaky voice which characterized his later 
years, "he is the kind of man who would 
rather do something badly for himself than 
to have somebody else do it well." 

(Outlook Magazine; December 11, 1909; 
on Parker's "Recollections.") 



AT THE FIRST INAUGURATION 

I saw Cleveland and Arthur sitting side by 
side in the Senate Chamber on March 4th. 
My first impression of Cleveland was ex- 
tremely unfavorable. The contrast with Ar- 
thur, who was a fine, handsome figure, was 
very striking. Cleveland's coarse face, his 
heavy, inert body, his great, shapeless hands, 
confirmed in my mind the attacks made upon 
him during the campaign. . . . Later I 
came to entertain a great respect for 
Cleveland, to admire the courage and consci- 
entiousness of his character. 

("Autobiography." By Robert M. La Follette.) 
[88] 



MRS. CLEVELAND SEES MODJESKA 

Not long after Mr. Cleveland's marriage, 
being in Washington, I made a box party, 
embracing Mrs. Cleveland, and the Speaker 
and Mrs. Carlisle, at one of the theaters 
where Madame Modjeska was appearing. 
The ladies expressing a desire to meet the 
famous Polish actress who had so charmed 
them, I took them after the play behind the 
scenes. Thereafter we returned to the 
White House where supper was waiting us, 
the President amused and pleased, when 
told of the agreeable incident. 

The next day there began to buzz reports 
to the contrary. At first covert, they gained 
in volume and currency until a distin- 
guished Republican party leader put his im- 
print upon them in an after-dinner speech, 
going the length of saying the newly- wedded 
Chief Magistrate had actually struck his 
wife and forbidden me the Executive Man- 
sion, though I had been there every day dur- 
ing the week that followed. 

Mr. Cleveland believed the matter too pre- 
posterous to be given any credence and 
took it rather stoically. But naturally Mrs. 
Cleveland was shocked and outraged, and I 
made haste to stigmatize it as a lie out of 
whole cloth. Yet though this was sent away 

[89] 



by the Associated Press and published broad- 
cast I have occasionally seen it referred to 
by persons over eager to assail a man in- 
capable of an act of rudeness to a woman. 

("Marse Henry, an Autobiography." 
By Henry Watterson.) 



A YOUNG VISITOR 

One day early in the summer, while sit- 
ting on the recessed piazza overlooking Sip- 
pican Harbor, Mr. Cleveland was visited by 
a small youngster, unattended, who wished 
to pay his respects, with due formality, and 
assure the newcomer that he was very wel- 
come to Marion. Mr. Cleveland greeted the 
polite lad as solemnly as the importance of 
the occasion demanded. In the course of the 
interchange of courtesies, it became evident 
that the visitor was under a misapprehen- 
sion, for when Mr. Cleveland referred to 
the fact that he had been defeated in the 
late election, and declared that the people did 
not want him in the White House any longer, 
the boy exclaimed : "Oh, I had not heard of 
that. Sir!" and expressed the greatest sym- 
pathy at the untoward event. 

I saw no betrayal of inward amusement 
on Mr. Cleveland's face. All went as grave- 
ly as if the colloquy had taken place in the 
Blue Room between the Chief Executive and 
a foreign ambassador. 

("Grover Cleveland: A Record of Friendship." 
By Richard Watson Gilder.) 

[90] 



BABY RUTH RECITES 

Ruth, the eldest, was then about three 
years old. There was a joyful Christmas at 
the White House, and General John M. Wil- 
son, who during both administrations was 
Mr. Cleveland's aide, describes an incident 
of the day as the most touching he ever wit- 
nessed — Ruth, in holiday attire, under a 
beautiful Christmas tree, repeating the 
Psalm beginning, **The Lord is my shep- 
herd," and at its conclusion Mr. Cleveland 
taking the child up into his strong arms and 
kissing her, while tears were raining down 
his cheeks. 

(Anecdotes of President Cleveland; Century 
Magazine; March, 1913.) 



HOW IT FEELS TO BE PRESIDENT 

"A sensitive man is not happy as Presi- 
dent," he said. **It is fight, fight, fight, all 
the time. ... I looked forward to the 
close of my term as a happy release from 
care. But I am not sure that I wasn't more 
unhappy out of office than in. A term in 
the presidency accustoms a man to great 
duties. He gets used to handling tremen- 
dous enterprises, to organizing forces that 
may affect at once and directly the welfare 
of the world. After the long exercise of 
power, the ordinary aflfairs of life seem petty 

[91] 



and commonplace. An ex-President prac- 
ticing law or going into business is like a 
locomotive hauling a delivery wagon. He 
has lost his sense of proportion. The con- 
cerns of other people and even his own af- 
fairs seem too small to be worth bothering 
about. I thought I was glad when Mr. Mc- 
Kinley came to Washington to be inaugu- 
rated, and I took a drink of rye whiskey 
with him in the White House and shook 
hands with him and put my hat on my head 
and walked out a private citizen. But I miss 
the strain, the spur to constant thinking, the 
consciousness of power, the knowledge that 
I was acting for seventy million people 
daily." 

(In The Interpreter's House ; American 
Magazine; September, 1908,) 



THE OPINIONS OF FOUR REPUBLICANS 

*'The fame of Grover Cleveland is secure 
because of the ruggedness, the simplicity of 
his character, and because of his inflexible 
determination in executing his honest judg- 
ment." 

Charles Evans Hughes. 



"Grover Cleveland earned the sincere 
gratitude of his countrymen. ... He 
was a great President. . . . Through- 
out his political life he showed those rugged 

[92] 



virtues of the public servant and citizen, the 
emulation of which by those who follow him 
will render progress of our political life to- 
ward better things a certainty." 

William Hoivard Taft 



"The powerful influence of a strong and 
noble character made manifest in high sta- 
tion is the chief legacy of Grover Cleveland 
to his countrymen. . . . With high and 
unquestioning courage he stood always for 
what he believed to be just and honest and 
best for his country. With unconcealed 
scorn and wrath he stood against all sham 
and chicanery." 

Elihu Root. 



"As mayor of the city, as governor of his 
state, and twice as President, he showed 
signal powers as an administrator, coupled 
with entire devotion to the country's good, 
and a courage that quailed before no hos- 
tility when once he was convinced where his 
duty lay." 

Theodore Roosevelt 



[93] 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

V 

No standard or comprehensive life of 
Grover Cleveland has yet appeared. The 
best books to read are the following. 

On Cleveland: 

"Recollections of Grover Cleveland." 
By George F. Parker. 

"Grover Cleveland: A Record of 
Friendship." 

Ry Richard Watson Gilder. 

*'Mr. Cleveland: A Personal Impres- 
sion." 

By Jesse Lynch Williams. 

By Cleveland: 

"Addresses, State Papers and Letters." 
"Presidential Problems." 
"Fishing and Shooting Sketches." 

On the History of the Period: 

"Twenty Years of the Republic, 1885- 
1905." 

By Harry Thurston Peck. 



[94] 




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